Hi, darlings. It's me, Annaelise.

So, Keira's out for the day/night. She needs some rest. She's been doing so much these past few days, she needs to quiet down. She's fine though, except for a minor case of post nasal drip. But no need for worry! She'll be gone for this weekend. Me and the girls shall me filling up for her.

I, however, am here to entertain you. Let me entertain you! *guitar riff*

*laughs* I guess things do rub off after a while. It's a Queen reference if you didn't catch that.

Queen was on of my favourite bands going up. I really liked them. When I was in college, that's all I'd listen to.

I got a honours' degree in ecology, in the same year when my band, Lioness, made it's first attempt in signing. It failed, but it took months.

I feel like they were pushing us off to the side because we all were women.

Sexist bastards.

The same year they signed another band called Girlschool, who got kuddos from Motörhead. We were dating, and some are married to the guys in Iron Maiden!

These boys! From left to right: Bruce is Charlotte's, Dave is Kat's {married}, Steve is Lily's {married}, Nicko's Sam's {married} and then there's my boy Adrian.^-^

Although, Girlschool, actually were really nice girls and they became our friends, after that. The drummer's really cute, too, as well as the guitarist, Kim. I like her a lot.

She reminds me of a past lover of mine named Darcy, also a she, named after the male character in Pride and Prejudice.

But anyways, just a heads up, the music business in 1980 was messed up completely. It still is, more so.

Well, maybe not all of the music business. I'm the co-manager for Lioness along with the lovely Rod Smallwood. Martin Birch, Steve Harris and Lily are our producers, and our record label is Sanctuary Records, which is comprised of some really nice dudes.

Our roadies are nice too, but some of them, think we can't do things for ourselves sometimes. Sometimes, they pack our bags and fix our strings, when we're capable of doin that sort of thing ourselves.

Most of the time, if a guitar string breaks, then Nancy, our keyboardist/organist, can fill in the guitar part with one hand. Or we can give one to one of two guitar techs and they can fix it while we grab another guitar. It's simple.

We, unlike other bands, are so thankful for our roadies. After a tour ends we usually go to a banquet hall and everyone comes. Everyone, who helped us, everyone who's supported us. It's really fun.

Each night after we do the show, Charlotte and I go to the local bar and drink with some of the chaps that are off, or are done with work.

I once asked them was song would you describe the roadie's way of life, they replied, "The Road Crew" by Motörhead.

I've heard about some of the things the other girls do. Go out window-shopping or pull pranks on Rod, or now and again dance with them, have some fun with them, so they don't go 'tour crazy'.

'Tour crazy' is, by definition, going mad by the monotonous life of touring.

I usually bet on which of the Maiden boys go mad first. It's usually always Bruce. Being the frontman, he has a lot on his shoulders.

Sometimes with vocals he does, it puts a strain on his voice, meaning he can't even speak for some time afterwards.

That's when Charlotte comes in.

Charlotte sings the set. She was a bloody good job at it too.

Imagine the female Ian Gillan mixed with the sexually charged Robert Plant and the rawness of Roger Daltrey. That's her.

Once in '84-'85, Bruce was sick, a bad case of laryngitis, so he went back to the hotel with Kat, after Steve said Charlotte could do the vocals for that night. Adrian was sick, with flu, I believe, so our drummer and the most motherly out of us, Sam, stayed with him.

I heard that she turned off all the lights, and they talked, while he laid his head in her lap. It sounded like it was cute.

I trusted her.

I have trusting issues, or I did in the 70s. I was in my early twenties in the 70s, anxious to start anew, after my family broke apart. My father, a lawyer went his way, my mother went hers, leaving me behind with whatever money they saved up for me.

My grandfather let me stay at his place for a while and then he let me loose after a year or so, when he found out I had a girlfriend, Darcy, the one I mentioned before.

We fought and broke up, and that's when I met Charlotte. She was a bloody gorgeous woman. She still is, but the first time I met her, she was a goddess to me.

You better believe I was turned on. {Did I forget to mention to you that mostly all the members of my band are bi?}

She said she was a singer, and a prositute of sorts. We talk, shared a few drinks, and the topic of living came up.

She said she needed another to pay the rest of the rent.

The next day, I had a bedroom all to myself at 22, and I had a pretty good idea on what was going to come next.

My first impressions on the girls, later bandmates were so: Kathryn, quiet girl, Lily, pretty and stuck up smartass, Max {Manth/Sam in later years}, the adrongynous cute drummer type, Lizzie, MPD sad type, Roxanne, the chainsmoking perky one.

Some of them were wrong, yes, like Lily's not stuck up, a smartass, yes sometimes, but never snotty and mean. Kathryn's shy, but she has anxiety attacks. She's not used to change much. Manth, she was a drummer, drumming for young bands, going by a stage name, because no one who question her gender behind a drum kit. You can barely see her face behind all those toms and cymbals. Lizzie did have multi-personality disorder and she was depressed. Charlotte was also depressed. And Roxy, dear Roxy, she had something to her that you couldn't put a finger on.

I spent a lot of nights with the girls before I truly trusted them.

Then, on Christmas Eve 1982, Lizzie was killed by a bunch of drunks in an alley.

I couldn't imagine the sorrow her boyfriend, Dennis, was feeling that day. I don't even think I've been close.

We'd been doing so good. We'd been friends for the past decade and then everything feel apart.

Charlotte went upstairs, Bruce ran up there too, to calm her down or be fucked by her. Manth went down stairs to cool down her hot-blood (she had anger management issues). Clive held me. Steve had his head in his hands. Dave and Lily trying to console Kat.

That day and the few days that follow we realised that 'Death is just a shadow, it stands by you like a friend, you just have to let it take you in it's home in the end.'

That's a quote from one of our songs. "Mes Amies," that we all wrote, for the new album. It's depressing. It makes me sad reading the quotes.

Lizzie's death, I think, pulled us together more than ever in a way.

Charlotte stopped being a harlot, Lily stopped being too over-controlling, Manth stopped hard drinking for 10 years. And we're still rocking it out there, with the memory of her beside us.

I have one of her guitars, a white and gold Les Paul. Kat has the other, a black and red telecaster. Charlotte has the choker she always wore. Lily has the pocketwatch and Sam has the journal Lizzie gave to her, she writes her thoughts about life and death in now.

À tout à l'heure, mes belles. I shall miss you. Until next time, je t'amie, et bonne nuit. *kiss, kiss*
♠️Annaelise♠️